(Make Me A) TRISTE© Mixtape Episode 185: Trust Fund

Trust Fund (©James Hankins)

Trust Fund is the musical project of singer-songwriter Ellis Jones. The band, which featured a rotating lineup of musicians, self-released an EP titled I’ve Been Ages in 2012, followed, one year later, by a second, Don’t Let Them Begin, and a split EP with the Welsh band Joanna Gruesome in 2014. In early 2015, Trust Fund signed to Turnstile Records for the release of the first full-length album, No One’s Coming for Us, and in the autumn of the same year, the second album, Seems Unfair, followed on the same label. After moving from Bristol to Leeds, a third album, We Have Always Lived in the Harolds, was released in June 2016 without a record label. The title is a reference to Shirley Jackson’s 1962 novel We Have Always Lived in the Castle. In July 2018, Trust Fund released their fourth full-length album, Bringing the Backline, which was intended to be their last and coincided with the decision to disband. It was only in March 2022, that Jones decided to go back to the Trust Fund name and began releasing new singles. On November 1st 2024, Trust Fund released a new album, the fifth, Has It Been a While, recorded in Sheffield by producer and close friend Joe Mackenzie Todd, via Tapete Records. On Has It Been A While? Jones strips his songs down to classical guitar and vocals, supported by captivating string quartet arrangements provided by Maria Grig.

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(Make Me A) TRISTE© Mixtape Episode 184: The Gentle Spring

The Gentle Spring (©Philippe Dufour)

The Gentle Spring are a new group, formed by Michael Hiscock, Emilie Guillaumot and Jérémie Orsel. Michael has an illustrious pop history, having been a founder member of The Field Mice, possibly the most beloved band on Sarah Records in the 1990s. When Michael and his friend Bobby Wratten formed The Field Mice, the two of them very quickly created a set of songs whose emotional honesty, raw guitars and perfect pop melodies pierced the hearts of a generation of indiepop fans, kids who were unmoved by the posturing of mainstream indie, and who didn’t want to spend time in fields dancing at 24-hour raves. The Field Mice were the band who defined the meaning and the spirit of Sarah Records.  Defiantly in love with pop, defiantly un-macho, defiantly… sensitive. And now, remarkably, Michael has done it again. With his new musical partner Emilie, The Gentle Spring have created a fresh new iteration of indiepop music. Once again, the songs are unafraid of raw emotions, brutally honest and is still in love with big pop melodies. They are still…. sensitive.
Their first album, Looking Back at The World, will be out via Skep Wax Records on January 17th 2025.

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(Make Me A) TRISTE© Mixtape Episode 183: Rocky Lorelei

Rocky Lorelei

Rocky Lorelei represents the solo lo fi musical work of Rachel Taylor (also member of Slipper), who was born and raised beside Lake Ontario in Toronto, and is currently set up in Berlin. Her musical processes run parallel to her psychic processes; writing and recording songs is her most vital means of cultivating an understanding of her inner and outer life experiences, bringing a symmetry to her music and her sense of self. Began as just bedroom recordings in Toronto, when Rocky moved to Glasgow in 2016 -encouraged by Sean Armstrong (Spinning Coin, The Yawns, Slipper)- she also moved the project onto the stage. “Rocky Lorelei began as a bedroom recording project in around 2012 in Toronto; a dear friend gifted me a 4-track, and off I went into the strange and tiny world of recording onto cassette, a zone which I have remained in ever since. I figured out how to record and produce my songs on my own (with a little help from my friends) and then spent some time writing, recording, and releasing a couple of EP’s in my room, up until I moved from Toronto to the UK in 2015. I eventually landed in Glasgow (Scotland) and it was there that Rocky Lorelei became a live project as well. Since then I have moved to Berlin, where I continue to document aspects of my psychic life through songs, to record them onto tape, and to play them live. I have co-founded a cassette label here, called Rehberge Records, through which my collaborator Sean Armstrong and I release our work —our most recent release being my new album Bury My Face In A Flower“.

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(Make Me A) TRISTE© Mixtape Episode 182: The Ladybug Transistor (The Albemarle Sound 25th Anniversary Expanded Edition special mixtape)

The Ladybug Transistor in Prospect Park (Photo by Erick Schonfeld)

The Ladybug Transistor were a Brooklyn-based indie pop group associated with The Elephant Six Collective. Started in 1995 by Gary Olson, Edward Powers and Javier Villegas, the band quickly released Marlborough Farms on Park N’ Ride Records. With Jeff Baron and Jennifer Baron added to the lineup, they released Beverley Atonale in 1997, this time on Merge Records. Powers left the band, and the remaining members, with San Fadyl and Sasha Bell of The Essex Green, embarked on a United States tour. With a more stable lineup, the band released The Albemarle Sound in 1999, as well as added violinist Julia Rydholm, also of The Essex Green, to the lineup. In 2001, Argyle Heir was released, and the band released a self-titled album in 2003 which was recorded in their own Marlborough Farms studio. In April 2006, Fadyl began fighting serious asthma attacks that led to his death in 2007. The band released its sixth album, Can’t Wait Another Day, the same year. This line-up included Kyle Forester (Crystal Stilts) and Ben Crum of Great Lakes.For their seventh album, Clutching Stems, Olson, Forester and Rydholm gathered new recruits Mark Dzula (The Magic Caravan, Jukebox Radio), Eric Farber (The Lisps), and Michael O’Neill (MEN). The album, recorded once again at Marlborough Farms studio and Sunset Cottage, Poconos, was released in 2011 via Merge Records and was their last record.
The Ladybug Transistor are now back with an expanded 25th Anniversary reissue and tour for their timeless indiepop classic album The Albemarle Sound.  

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(Make Me A) TRISTE© Mixtape Episode 181: Capitol

Capitol

Capitol is a Hamilton, Ontario quintet made up of brothers, RJ and Josh Kemp, Matt and Wes Lintott, and Chris McLaughlin. Over seven years since their debut, they have released one full-length album, Dream Noise, out in 2019 via Meritorio Records, a four-song E.P, All The Rest Of My Heads (2021), an instrumental film score (Light Between Us, 2023) and several singles. Their next effort is their sophomore album, Sounds Like a Place, out November 8th through Meritorio Records. This eleven-song record has been a long time coming, with the initial  recording at Toronto’s Union Sound Company back in the summer of 2022.  Sounds Like a Place bears a mix of the industrial, electric hum of Capitol’s hometown of Hamilton and the shoegazey dream-pop that they’ve been leaning into since their debut single, 2017’s English Girls. This time  heavily inspired by alternative indie artists of the 90s/00s and still  tinged with a dash of 80s New Wave, the album weaves in and out of genre  and decade. Capitol enjoy films, local beer, and making each other cry of laughter with a single glance.

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